The Israeli Air Force struck targets in central Syria on Saturday evening, according to official Syrian media reports.
“At about 7:45 p.m. on Saturday, the Israeli enemy launched an aerial aggression from the direction of the north of Lebanon that targeted some points in the central region,” said a Syrian military source, according to the Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA).
The strikes cause material damage but no casualties, according to the report.
The London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reported that explosions were heard in the town of Masyaf and nearby areas in the west of government-controlled Hama province.
It added in a report on Saturday that “both Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement had a presence in the area.”
According to SOHR the “strikes were the eighth by Israel in Syria this year and targeted weapons depots and research centers for the development of missiles and drones.”
The Alma Research and Education Center, an Israeli defense watchdog, said that at least three of the targets hit on Saturday were attacked “in a daylight airstrike in the Masyaf area, in northwest Syria.” It noted that the area hosts a compound of the Syrian Scientific Studies and Research Institute, known by its French acronym, CERS, “which has been attacked in the past and is involved in Hezbollah’s precision missile project.”
On March 8, the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps vowed to avenge the death of two of its officers in a reported Israeli air strike in the Damascus region, according to Reuters.
